Search age:

Search in:

High Court to test Centrelink fraud laws

Belinda Merhab

The High Court has agreed to hear the case of a Melbourne woman accused of defrauding Centrelink, testing the constitutionality of retrospective welfare fraud laws introduced last year.

Victoria Legal Aid (VLA) successfully applied on Friday to have the case of single mother Kelli Keating heard by the High Court, a case it says could affect 15,000 past convictions as well as future prosecutions.

Keating has been charged with welfare fraud under legislation passed in July last year which made it a criminal offence for a person to not tell Centrelink of any change that might affect their entitlements within 14 days.

The legislation applies retrospectively, from March 2000.

Advertisement

Centrelink alleges Keating was overpaid $6942 after failing to declare her income.

VLA's barrister, Debbie Mortimer SC, told the full bench of the High Court in Melbourne that the legislation "invented" and then imposed a duty on a person that was incapable of being performed.

"The commonwealth has criminalised conduct that was not criminal in any sense at the time it was committed," Ms Mortimer told Justices Kenneth Hayne, John Heydon and Virginia Bell.

Wendy Abraham QC, for the commonwealth, said welfare recipients were always aware of their responsibility to report changes to their income.

"Any recipient of a social security benefit would have been under no misapprehension ... that there is a requirement to notify of a change of circumstances," she said.

"One doesn't simply go on Centrelink and get it forever."

The High Court agreed to hear the matter next Tuesday.

Outside court, VLA director of civil justice Kristen Hilton said the case was about challenging the breadth of the law and whether or not parliament can pass retrospective laws.

She said one in three overpayments were the result of mistakes made by Centrelink.

"This is not about getting people off the hook where there has been clearly fraudulent behaviour," she said.

"It's about people who have made a mistake, it's about people who haven't understood the system.

"It's a very complex system and we know that people on Centrelink are generally people who perhaps don't have high literacy levels, they may be from non-English speaking backgrounds, they may have a mental health issue or a disability.

"It's the most vulnerable getting caught up in the system and this legislation intends to cast that net even wider."